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Edmond Xavier Kapp

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Edmond Xavier Kapp
Born
Edmond Xavier Kapp

(1890-11-05)5 November 1890
London
Died29 October 1978(1978-10-29) (aged 87)
NationalityBritish
Education
Known forPortrait painting and caricatures

Edmond Xavier Kapp (5 November 1890 – 29 October 1978) was a British portrait painter, draughtsman and caricaturist who during his career depicted many of the most famous politicians, artists and musicians of the time.

Life and work

A Brother and Sister Sheltering in the Underground, 1941 (Art.IWM ART LD 795)

Kapp was born in London, the son of a German-born wine merchant who was a vice-president of the London Jewish Hospital.[1] Kapp attended Dame Alice Owen's School and then Christ's College, Cambridge, where he studied for the Medieval and Modern Language Tripos. Whilst at Cambridge he had a number of caricatures published in both Granta and the Cambridge Magazine and had a one-man exhibition at the Fitzwilliam Museum. After leaving Cambridge, Kapp set up his own studio and was successful in selling his caricatures to various weekly and monthly periodicals.[2]

In the First World War Kapp served in the British Army as a lieutenant with the Royal Sussex Regiment. Kapp was gassed and, later in the conflict, worked in Intelligence at General Headquarters. After the war Kapp studied for a short periods both in England, Paris and Berlin. He had his first of solo exhibition at the Leicester Galleries in 1922 and went on to have over several dozen one-man shows in Britain and abroad.[3] Kapp produced a series of lithographs of diplomats at the League of Nations for the British Museum and the National Portrait Gallery.[1]

From 1922 to 1930 Kapp was married to the writer and political activist Yvonne Helene Mayer (1903-1999).[1] In 1932 he married the sculptor and painter Polia Chentoff who died the following year.[3]

In the Second World War Kapp received several short commissions from the War Artists' Advisory Committee, most notably for a series called Life under London of people sheltering in the London Underground and in the crypt of St. Martin's-in-the-Fields during the Blitz.[4][5] In 1945 Kapp was commissioned by UNESCO to produce portraits of the delegates at its first international congress in Paris. In 1961 the Whitechapel Art Gallery held a retrospective of his work which include some 310 pieces. Shortly afterwards Kapp largely abandoned figurative work and embraced abstract painting. Further extensive exhibitions of his work were held at the Barber Institute of Fine Arts in both 1999 and 2001.[3] Kapp's artwork is held in several national British collections, most notably those of the Victoria and Albert Museum and the National Portrait Gallery.[6][7]

References

  1. ^ a b c William D. Rubinstein, Michael A. Jolles & Hilary L. Rubinstein (2011). The Palgrave Dictionary of Anglo-Jewish History. palgrave macmillan. ISBN 978-1-4039-3910-4.
  2. ^ Frances Spalding (1990). 20th Century Painters and Sculptors. Antique Collectors' Club. ISBN 1 85149 106 6.
  3. ^ a b c David Buckman (1998). Artists in Britain Since 1945 Vol 1, A to L. Art Dictionaries Ltd. ISBN 0 95326 095 X.
  4. ^ Brain Foss (2007). War paint: Art, War, State and Identity in Britain, 1939-1945. Yale University Press. ISBN 978-0-300-10890-3.
  5. ^ Imperial War Museum. "War artists archive, E Kapp". Imperial War Museum. Retrieved 2 June 2015.
  6. ^ "Collection;-Edmond Xavier Kapp". Victoria and Albert Museum. Retrieved 1 June 2015.
  7. ^ "Search the Collection;-Edmond Xavier Kapp". National Portrait Gallery, London. Retrieved 1 June 2015.
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